Ella and James Preece are a Catholic couple living in Kingston Upon Hull in Yorkshire in the UK. This is our blog.

Items Tagged With: Eurovision Song Contest

Introduced by Zosia in 2004, the Eurovision Party has become a regular part of every year. The songs are rubbish, we always lose, but we have a good time. This year, we left our planning a bit late, we completely failed to realise that Eurovision was even happening until the day before... fortunately a few phone calls was all it took to round up some friends.

For those of you in America who may not be familiar. The Eurovision Network is an association of broadcasters who swap TV shows and news clips. Once a year they hold a song contest. It used to be taken very seriously when my parents were young but it's turned in to a bit of a joke.

The procedure is this.. countries submit songs, drippy girl songs, comedy songs, ballads etc. Then every country votes for the countries they like the most. England always loses. Winners from previous years have included Ukraine in 2004 with Wild Dancers and Finland in 2006 with Hard Rock Hallelujah.

This year, the song that should have won was was undoubtedly this one from Latvia...

But, alas, the pirates were robbed. We also quite liked this one from Croatia...

But, alas, the old men were robbed (despite the awesome playing of bottles). The offering from Bosnia was crazy as was the song from Spain. Fr Massie liked Denmark.

Subsequent YouTube searching revealed that we missed out on Bulgaria which never made it to the final and a comedy Turkey from Ireland resplendent with lines like "Eastern Europe we like you, do you like Irish stew?".

The final result? The UK came joint last alongside Poland. The winners were Russia with crap. As Terry Wogan said towards the end, it's not really a song contest anymore.

But was it ever?

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To the Blessed Virgin Prayer for England

O Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God and our most gentle Queen and Mother, look down in mercy upon England thy "Dowry" and upon us all who greatly hope and trust in thee.

By thee it was that Jesus our Saviour and our hope was given unto the world; and He has given thee to us that we might hope still more.

Plead for us thy children, whom thou didst receive and accept at the foot of the cross.

O sorrowful Mother! intercede for our separated brethren, that with us in the one true fold they may be united to the supreme Shepherd, the Vicar of thy Son.

Pray for us all, dear Mother, that by faith fruitful in good works we may all deserve to see and praise God, together with thee, in our heavenly home.

Amen.

Couple's Prayer

O God, our heavenly Father, protect and bless us. Deepen and strengthen our love for each other day by day.

Grant that by thy mercy, neither of us may ever say one unkind word to the other. Forgive and correct our faults, and make us constantly to forgive one another should one of us unconsciously hurt the other.

Make us and keep us sound and well in body, alert in mind, tender in heart, and devout in spirit. O Lord, grant us each to rise to the other's best. Then, we pray thee, add to our common life such virtues as only thou canst give.

And so, O Father, consecrate our life and love completely to thy worship, and to the service of all about us, especially those whom thou hast appointed us to serve, that we may always stand before thee in happiness and peace; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen.